Food and Drink

February 12, 2010

It's not that I can't cook, or that I won't cook. I can actually whip up a pretty decent meal when I decide to -- and more importantly, when I've had the foresight to stock up on ingredients that are meant to go together. The rest of the time, well... yeah, I do things to food, but I wouldn't necessarily call it cooking. Surely the, uh, element of improvisation, and the randomness of the ingredients that come together in my hands in these occasions, disqualify me from any such pretension.

An example, you ask?

Eh. As I write this, I'm chomping on my latest offense against gastronomy, which I assembled at 4 am from the twin dead zones that are my pantry and refrigerator.

December 16, 2009

We had our lab pre-holiday party last night in the form of a wine tasting, and since we're all incorrigible bio science geeks we did it as a double-blind study (that means none of the participants had any way of knowing what we were tasting and of course, scoring, until the big reveal at the end -- the point being to eliminate any expectation bias).

I won't go into the details of the scoring, but here are a couple of graphs of the results. The "Bang for Buck" graph is particularly eloquent : as a group, we're a pretty cheap date!

Someone more oenologically knowledgeable than I suggested that that was a bad bottle of Duoro... and out of respect for (or fear of) my kickboxing Portuguese colleague, I will not dispute that hypothesis.

November 27, 2009

A controversial Scottish brewery has launched what it described as the world's strongest beer - with a 32% alcohol content.

Tactical Nuclear Penguin has been unveiled by BrewDog of Fraserburgh.

BrewDog was previously branded irresponsible for a 18.2% beer called Tokyo, which it then followed with a low alcohol beer called Nanny State.

I'm skeptical of the organoleptic qualities of the beverage in question, but I wouldn't mind trying a deci-pint of it. And I LOVE the name. Very spirited, if you'll pardon the lousy wordplay. The label is fun too, it reads:

This is an extremely strong beer; it should be enjoyed in small servings and with an air of aristocratic nonchalance.

Well the, if you look for me this weekend, I shall be in the 'drawing room working on my aristocratic nonchalance.

Of course a bunch of people now have their knickers all up in a twist... which was obviously the point of the whole exercise. Mission accomplished, BrewDog! Have a biscuit.

August 10, 2009

Take a whole wheat English muffin, toasted to taste; smear both inner halves with luscious dark chocolate spread (while the muffin's still hot so the chocolate melts into the spongey interior); using the chocolate spread as glue, cover the muffin halves with blueberries and/or raspberries; squish them all together and devour with delight.

If you squint really hard it kind of looks like the head of a Tyrannosaurus with its mouth full of fruit. Which may seem unlikely to most rational people but would presumably not surprise hardcore creationists who believe that before the Fall, all dinosaurs were friendly vegetarians and only started eating meat after that unpleasant business with Eve and the Apple in the Garden with the Talking Snake.

But I really shouldn't make fun of that because it's a matter of Faith of course.

*tries to nod respectfully then breaks out in fits of hysterical laughter*

Mwaahahaahaaaahahaaaa!*

* I will not podcast my Evil Laugh, Mikeachim. Come on over here to hear it, I dare you.

August 07, 2009

And it's not just the looks; you can taste it too, something not quite right, a little bit off, just enough to disappoint the discriminating palate. Fortunately it all goes back to normal after some energetic mixing followed by gentle cooling down. No refrigeration, mind you! Brutal temperature swings are BAD for chocolate.

July 21, 2009

My previous post having moved me to soul-searching ruminations pertaining to my attachment to my home country and culture, ... I grew hungry. In itself, a very Belgian reflex, I would argue. Like I said, we're hobbits.

So anyway. I set out in search of Belgian cuisine, to celebrate this here national holiday in proper patriotic fashion. When I say "set out" of course I mean "launched Google in my browser".

Two results came up; one restaurant far away in Arlington, and one pub rather close by that I'd been to before: the Publick House in Washington Square. I remembered having a fish waterzooi there that was quite lovely despite being thoroughly adapted to American tastes (waaaaay too much cream). Not negligible to my decision process, I should add, was the fact that their beer list is beyond impressive (if pricey). They have Chouffe on tap, for crying out loud!

So, off I toddled. I ended up getting seated in the section called the Monk's Cell, which is perhaps appropriate to my general lifestyle. If you take as ecclesiastical example someone like Friar Tuck ;-)

After an apéritif of Chouffe (which the bartender insisted on calling "La" Chouffe) I had a rather nice moules-frites, with mussels cooked in Affligem blonde, tomato and spinach, marred only by the overabundant sprinkling of grated cheese (cheese! on mussels! the horror!) which I had to scrape off before any enjoyment could be had. Please note that in this case, it was not my admittedly ever present prejudice against cheese (not zombies) at work, but the very reasonable culinary observation that the strong taste of cheese (to the cook's credit, this was not the average American certified edible rubber, but something rather more European, possibly Italian) tends to overwhelm the delicate aroma of the mussels themselves.

In contrast, the Affligem broth was lovely, and I must say the sweetness of the Affligem did perfectly offset the bitterness of the spinach. So well that I could not resist dunking the spongy substance they gave me under the name of bread to sop up as much broth as I could. I usually look down on dunking (or "saucing" as we say when the point is to mop up leftover sauce on a plate) as provincial, Walloon or worse, French (kidding...) but on this occasion it was simply too tasty to pass up.

This reasonably proportioned feast was nicely complemented by a Gulden Draak, which I ordered with the appropriate Flemish pronunciation, much to the despair of the poor waitress who came back three times to make sure of what I had ordered.

I'm presently having dessert while I type this on the old iPhone -- and surprisingly, it's not taking me much longer than it would on a regular computer keyboard, because I'm an old-school two-finger-plus-the-thumb-for-space typer anyway (where have you gone, Mavis Beacon?), despite what some might think due to my well-known proficiency in computer-related "stuff".

Dessert, by the way, is a beer called "Brugse Zot" (roughly translated as "fool from Bruges", if you ignore all the semantic subtleties of the word "zot" -- see this link for a detailed explanation) which turns out to be sort of interesting in the sense that it reminds me of noodles, but is otherwise not particularly world-shaking, although I may be doing it some injustice in having it after a medium-to-heavyweight like the Gulden Draak.

April 28, 2009

Specifically, for the "Biologist's Field Guide to Workplace Tippling" that I plan to write at some point, to make the most of my postdoctoral training.

Faced with an emergency situation that many field scientists are all too familiar with, the friendly (is there any other kind?) marine biologists at Southern Fried Science have cooked up a simple yet innovative solution to deal with the problem of running out of beer during an extended data-gathering expedition.

Awright! Too bad I'm a bench-bound lab rat, I'd love to test that protocol in situ. I've half a mind to hijack the lab's coffee machine and try it anyway, but much of the romance is lost from not being on an actual expedition. Also, laziness whispers that it's easier to abduct a few bottles from the departmental beer hour every Friday.

Incidentally, I love the following comment left at their blog:

"Now I understand why so many ships carry Vegemite. I had previously thought it’s only practical use was to deter pirates."

April 22, 2009

Part 1 of a three-part series by January visitor Mom(with comments by me in brackets)

Small is tall, right?

At least when you order a "small" coffee in any of the Starbucks shops in the US...

You say "one small Americano" and the waitress immediately signals her colleague "one tall Americano". OK, you're just off the plane and think your hearing is still impaired from landing or you're dumb tired from the trip?

Nope, no misunderstanding here, just that strange Starbucks logic where small is "tall", medium is "grande" and large is ... "venti". [The largest size, yet the only one that doesn't actually mean "large"!]

When you know that "venti" stands for 20 in Italian, you realize "one venti Americano" will be 20 ounces (i.e. almost 600 ml) of coffee served. Your daily allowance in one single cup?!

April 05, 2009

So today a bunch of us BAEF* fellows (Boat of 2008-2009, North-Eastern US crew) met up in New Haven, Connecticut for the annual luncheon hosted by our generous and kindly president, Prof. Boulpaep (of Yale University, hence the location).

We were abundantly wined and dined, led to mingle, then sent home with a packed dinner -- special Easter edition -- courtesy of the Boulpaep's very own flock**.

Let me just tell you, I'm about to make one heck of an omelet!***

* Belgian American Educational Foundation, a.k.a. the nice people who pay me to have fun. And just to clear up any misunderstandings, "having fun" in this context means doing my research. Well, in any context, really.

** Of geese, obviously. Not velociraptors. That would be dangerous. Plus I think you need a permit for those.

*** You should have seen me holding on anxiously to my giant egg all through the 2h30 drive, 15 min. metro ride and 20 min. walk home. I'm not sure what passersby must have thought, though the phrase "special needs" does come to mind.